


Be Prepared

by Nununununu



Category: The Locked Tomb Trilogy | Gideon the Ninth Series - Tamsyn Muir
Genre: Complicated Relationships, Don't copy to another site, During Canon, F/F, First Time, Mind Sex, Telepathic Sex, Trust, Use of Magic or Superpowers During Sex, Vaginal Fingering
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-26
Updated: 2020-06-26
Packaged: 2021-03-03 22:48:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,959
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24553402
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nununununu/pseuds/Nununununu
Summary: An unexpected application of newly learned abilities.
Relationships: Gideon Nav/Harrowhark Nonagesimus
Comments: 5
Kudos: 105
Collections: The First Annual Femslash Kink Exchange 2020





	Be Prepared

**Author's Note:**

  * For [reconditarmonia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/reconditarmonia/gifts).



> Set during those "several hours" at the end of chapter 19, before Gideon gets to have that sleep.
> 
> (Originally posted 19/06; date updated for author reveals)

“Griddle,” Harrowhark’s lightless black gaze fixed on her cavalier intently, accompanied by an aggressive jut of her pointy chin, “I need you stand up and stay very still.”

“Uh, what?” Gideon’s mouth was full of crisp, tart fruit – something Teacher had produced for her when they’d passed him on the way back to their chambers and she’d looked at him pleadingly. It was slightly sour but pleasingly tangy, waking up her taste buds and drawing saliva into her mouth, and she’d been enjoying it brainlessly without knowing what the hell it was, or thinking about anything further than the fact she was shortly going to fall on her face on her cot and pass out without even bothering to change. She swallowed noisily and then bit into a fresh mouthful, speaking around it just to watch Harrow’s goblin face pinch.

“I thought we had a bargain here,” Gideon pointed what was left of the fruit at her necromancer, “I’m _sure_ there were vows of eight and a half hours and never speaking about things.”

“We need to practice,” Harrow insisted, “A deal might have been made –”

(“ _Might_ have?” Gideon inserted, and was ignored).

“But there is time before your precious eight and a half hours,” Harrow rolled her eyes so hard it showed off the burst blood vessels delightfully.

“There’s really not,” Gideon bit into the hard stalk of the fruit experimentally, grimaced and tossed it on top of one of Harrow’s coveted musty books. A short stand-off commenced in which Harrow glowered at her silently and Gideon refused to repent.

“The inside of your head is _so loud_ ,” Giving up on one battle, Harrow persisted with the other. She was standing there in a corner by the door, wreathed in shadow and fusty blood-stained black, lurking like this was somewhere she’d never been before rather than their own rooms. It looked almost like she was expecting someone to try to enter through that door so she could spring on them and make them screech, Gideon thought.

The prospect would have been enough to make _her_ yell, that was for sure – Harrow, leaping at her in the attempt to attack. Not that her scrawny stick-like figure would make any kind of impact on her intended victim, aside from reflexive horror – anyone other than Dulcinea would be able to bat Harrow away like a ferrety kind of twig if the universe turned upside down and necromancers decided for some previously unheard of reason to give their cavaliers a day off and fight themselves via the most ridiculously limp-noodled, single-muscled form of hand-to-hand.

A vision of Ianthe and Harrow pulling each other’s hair and slapping at each other filled Gideon’s mind and she both snorted and shuddered.

“What were you saying again?”

Harrow had still been talking all this time, hadn’t she, but Gideon had totally tuned out.

“ _We need to practice_ ,” Harrow’s hiss was scalded; her tone the one she used when she thought Gideon was being particularly dense, “Stop being a moron and consider the fact that this _isn’t a game_ , you can’t just punch your way out of everything, and the next time I need to ride you we might die.”

“There are so many things wrong with what you just said I can’t even respond to them right now,” Gideon rubbed her sleeve across her face, leaving a smear so dirty across the fabric she knew without even looking at it that it would never wash out, and sighed, “So. _What_ is it you’re trying to get me to do?”

“I need you to trust me,” Harrow said, which was – yeah no.

“Had that conversation, not having it again,” Gideon began to stretch an arm out for her blankets. Her body felt fossilised – she might not be able to bring herself to crawl into bed, but maybe she could yank the covers over towards her and just pass out like that. “Ask me again after nine hours.”

“Eight and a half, and that time hasn’t started yet,” Harrow, however, was never one to let anything go, “I’m going to demonstrate that you can trust me.”

“Hell no,” Something odd was starting up inside Gideon’s chest and it accelerated when Harrow swept towards her, crouching down on the dirty floor in order to stare even more intensely at Gideon’s face.

Gideon thrust her tired hand up between them to block it out.

“If you don’t want to stand up for it, you can lie down,” Harrow pursed her lips.

“I can lie down and _sleep_ ,” Gideon hinted, aware her necromancer wasn’t going to let this go. And –

Well. To some extent (to a large extent, actually) –

Harrow did have a point. Not that Gideon had any desire to consider her necromancer ‘riding’ her again, but thinking about what had happened with the creature and to Magnus and Abigail –

“Ugh. _Fiiiine_ ,” Shoving herself to her feet with a sigh worthy of Harrow herself, Gideon forced her aching limbs into a few stretches, “Happy now?”

“Overjoyed,” Harrow’s voice was so deadpan it was practically oozing, “Now if you’d just given in and stood up five minutes ago –”

Gideon then had the pleasure of watching her necromancer endeavour to get up off her bony knees while losing track of her sniping, preoccupied with striving to hide a wince.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” She leaned forwards enough to grab Harrow’s bony wrist and hoisted her up, setting the other girl straight when she stumbled.

“Unhand me,” Harrow sought to yank her wrist back, baring her teeth when Gideon held on just to see what Harrow would do –

For a moment, she thought Harrow might bite her. But Harrow drew herself up – still notably truncated – drew a breath in through nostrils rimmed with a faint crust of blood – gross – and said, “Nav. I need to practice using your body.”

Gideon blinked at her, while her mind cycled through a series of _uh what? – Tremendous Titties & Terrific Tooshes #28 included that exact phrase in the story about the scientist and her test subject! –_ and – _I am the hell not Harrowhark Nonagesimus’ test subject! –_ and back to _uh what?_ again.

“Uh, what?” she said, and, “Are you just angling to make me your test subject?” which made Harrow look at her as if she was something execrable she’d scraped off her shoe.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” was her terse response, although – intriguingly and more than a little unnervingly – two spots of colour came to burn high in her cheeks. It made her look mad and feverish and only emphasised the pallor of the rest of her face. “Like I told you, your brain is noisy. So if I just _practice using your body_ ,” Her emphasising it didn’t make it any better the second time, “By which I mean seeing through your eyes, feeling what you feel –”

“Yeah, really don’t want to think about _that_ ,” Gideon pulled a face. She’d had enough of chomping her tongue before; she practically still had teeth marks in it despite the time that had passed. “I don’t need either of us to be bleeding everywhere before bed.”

Stupid thing to say to Harrow, really. It probably only encouraged her – the thought of blood.

“I’m not,” Harrow said instead, a little slowly, and stopped. That colour was still bright in her cheeks; her eyes were glistening to the extent she just needed to fling on a labcoat – stylishly black, no doubt – and start cackling, and then she could pass for that scientist in Gideon’s mag. Minus the magnificently immense bosom, of course. “I am not intending to cause you pain,” Harrow finished after a moment, and wet her lips.

“But it’ll hurt anyway,” It was Gideon’s turn to roll her eyes, “Well, whatever, I want to sleep –”

(“You’ve already established that multiple times,” Harrow muttered, and found she, this time, went ignored).

“So come on, have at thee, what the fuck, let’s just get on with it,” Something occurred to her, “Why standing up and staying still?”

“Because you’re _always moving_ , you imbecile,” Harrow said, like this was some sort of terrible failure, and then there it was, pressure in Gideon’s head that made her feel a bit like she needed to blow her nose and run for the crapper and cover her eyes with her hands to keep them inside the sockets all at once.

Her vision blurred, but resolved itself faster this time, allowing her to see her necromancer chew her bottom lip clearly – fantastic – and a bead of blood-tinged sweat run down from Harrow’s temple, and –

“Why –?”

“Shut up.”

Gideon persisted, “Why are we doing this while staring at each other, exactly?”

“I’m not staring at you,” Harrow’s teeth were gritted. She was also still staring. It felt like she was trying to cram too much of herself into Gideon’s head, and Gideon’s head was entirely understandably protesting. Rather than trying to shove Harrow away or break the connection however, she just dragged a breath in and imagined that feeling of fullness spreading down further into her, down her throat and her shoulders, into her arms. Sort of – spreading it out a bit.

“Mm,” Harrow made a tiny noise, eyelids flickering, and Gideon found that she grinned.

“You can feel that, huh?” She flexed.

“Yes, I can feel just how stupid you look at well as see it,” Harrow looked pained, but Gideon was getting the impression she could feel _Harrow_ in return, sort of, or at least an impression, and Harrow was –

“Nah, you’re lying – you’re impressed. Again,” Gideon did a squat, impulsive and smug, feeling the muscles in her thighs bunch, her stomach working as she rose back up.

Harrow, who had earlier proved she struggled simply to get to her feet, tutted but also quivered a bit.

“Hah,” Gideon was grinning even more now, feeling like she had an amount of power over her necromancer and grasping for it eagerly, greedily, “You want to ‘practice’, huh?” Like fuck was she standing still. She lunged.

“Griddle!” The connection between them wavered as Gideon stopped her fist just before it hit Harrow’s nose, wobbled, and then firmed. “Are you _trying_ to knock us both out, you absolute cretin? Do you remember the part where I could turn your tiny brain into mush?”

“Nope, I’m sure I’d remember it if you’d used those words,” Gideon wasn’t much abashed, although she did attempt to stop bouncing on her heels. Her tiredness wasn’t bothering her so much; it was like practicing with her broadsword – now she was up, she wanted to be swinging it, exhaustion be damned.

“Stop thinking about fighting,” She got a huff for that.

“Surely the whole _point_ of this is that I’m thinking about fighting,” Gideon refused to grimace as she _felt_ Harrow take a breath in of her own.

They continued staring at each other for a bit.

“So,” Gideon prompted, when Harrow’s high brow had furrowed but nothing else had really happened, “ _Using_ my body, huh? If not fighting, then what the hell else –” 

The unexpected sensation of a hand falling on her shoulder – there was no hand on her shoulder! – made her startle and yelp.

“ _Stop squirming_ ,” Harrow said this through gritted teeth.

“It’s – it’s you, oh damn fuck, I thought it was –” Gideon wasn’t even going to get onto what she’d thought it was. Vengeful, she thought-squeezed Harrow’s shoulder right back in return, and got an extremely constipated look from her necromancer.

“Don’t –” Harrow seethed, and then rephrased, simmering with what seemed much like resentment, “You shouldn’t be able to do that.”

“Surprise?” Gideon tried, accompanied by jazz hands, and attempted to give her simmering necromancer a heartily sarcastic mental pat on the head, “There there, it’s okay; I’m just that good.”

“You’re really not,” Harrow did the equivalent of putting a palm to Gideon’s chest and pushing her back, which was –

Well, they’d never physically touched each other like this – not exactly. Tried to kill each other, yeah sure; Gideon had definitely leapt on Harrow a number of times in the attempt to pound her bony face into the ground back in Drearburgh, and Harrow had retaliated – or tried to – although she tended to rely on bones. There was something bizarrely almost _appealing_ about being able to do this, and Gideon was abruptly very aware of the heavy thump of her heart and the whoosh of her breath and the fact that Harrow was feeling these things, fuck was that weird, and –

“ _Stop thinking about sex_ ,” Harrow ground out, a bead of blood welling up in the outside corner of one eye, and that should be damned off-putting, as should the fact they were still making eye contact, but Gideon could feel her necromancer’s lungs working, Harrow’s own breath coming a little fast.

“You’re only thinking that I’m thinking about sex,” She returned, although this wasn’t exactly true – had she been doing this with Coronabeth, for example, she’d _definitely_ have been thinking about sex and all the ways this kind of funky power could be utilised, such as by focusing on that feeling of the _other_ within her body, concentrating it on her –

“ _Griddle_ ,” Harrow snapped, knife sharp, and Gideon jerked a bit.

Those two spots were more blotches now, spread up the line of Harrow’s nose to spill onto her forehead, draining down her cheeks to darken her neck likewise. In short, Gideon’s necromancer was flushing and Gideon hadn’t even known Harrow had enough blood in her on a good day to do that – what there was had always seemed to be reserved for spilling out of her, rather than darkening her pallid skin.

“Are you –” A terrible – in some ways – suspicion went off in the back of her head, where it still felt like too much of Harrow was shoved. In other ways, this suspicion was sort of – sort of _thrilling_ , but Gideon really wasn’t going to examine that. She pointed at Harrow with an accusative finger this time, “ _You’re so into this_.”

“Hardly,” Harrow’s mouth pinched tighter than Crux’s arse. And now Gideon was thinking of Crux’s arse, oh god, she needed brain bleach.

Even in her extreme distress, however, Gideon was aware of something happening in her stomach – or was it Harrow’s stomach? – that wasn’t indigestion, and she tensed her thighs without even really thinking it, just testing a theory.

_Hmm_.

“You want to prove you’re trustworthy, huh?” A faintly incredulous grin crooked her lips – was she _really_ considering asking Harrow to – to – “You’re planning to _demonstrate_ it?”

“Griddle, whatever your juvenile mind is cooking up, I want no part in it,” Harrow said in her most sepulchral tone – the nuns back in Drearburgh would have wept.

“Oh, I think you do,” Gideon never could back down, not where a challenge was concerned. That and a tingle was building between her legs – and not one that meant she needed to pee. Both these factors were incredibly alarming, given the current company and _the fact these feelings were shared_ , _fuck_ , and also – well. Highly diverting.

It had been a long, long time since she’d been afforded the opportunity to get off. And going by the stirring she was sure she could sense between Harrow’s own legs in return – which woah, really, she did _not_ want to feel, except she also really kind of _did_ – it might have been even longer for her necromancer.

Funny that. Gideon would have thought Canaan House would be any necromancer’s wet dream.

“Have you ever even –” Her mouth started to blurt, half gleeful and half alarmed by the possibility, and a whole plethora of emotion shot across Harrow’s peaky face.

“Shut up, Nav.”

“Stop telling me to shut up,” Gideon – Gideon sort of reached out with her mind to cup Harrow’s cheek, not really knowing why she did it, but doing it nonetheless. Maybe to give her necromancer a shake. Maybe to – “You going to ever put your money where your mouth is?”

“Ninth House –” Harrow frothed with ire, but she was also signally failing to recede from Gideon’s head and the bones she had about her person remained just that – bones.

“Has jack shit,” Gideon completed for her, and ran that mental-hand of hers down to Harrow’s neck, mostly just because, mostly just to show she could and would do it, pushing Harrow as Harrow always did her, but also –

Also. They were both alive, weren’t they. And Gideon was discovering that she did, very badly, want to get off. She might not have much of a chance if things went tits up tomorrow – or soon enough – after all.

“It’s a saying, Harrow, _fuck_.”

“ _I know that_ ,” Harrow’s black eyes narrowed, but – but the pressure inside Gideon’s head and chest changed, sliding downwards, pooling into her stomach, pressing up against her pelvis, “You want to do this?”

Was she – Yes, she was genuinely checking. A shudder whispered over Gideon’s skin.

“Ah,” Harrow sounded pleased, evidently thinking she’d sensed a weakness, “You _do_ like it when I ask.”

“Screw you,” Gideon shot back, which wasn’t her best retort, but she felt she could be forgiven for it given it felt like hands were grazing the outside of her thighs – not skeletal, thank fuck, but just the – the _impression_ of hands that she was fervently pretending weren’t Harrow’s, but was also highly aware that they sort of _were_ – 

“Oh no,” Triumph flashed across Harrow’s peaked features this time, “The victory, Nav, is going to be _mine_.”

“ _My_ body,” Gideon reminded her, as if Harrow was ever going to quit thinking of her as – as property, most likely – although the look on Harrow’s face wasn’t one of someone looked at something they owned.

It was more like Harrow was looking at her like Gideon was something she _wanted_.

“Hell,” Gideon swore fervently, and let those invisible hands of her own wander down Harrow’s neck in a sort of caress, feeling out the shape of those bony shoulders beneath all that fusty black.

They ended up on the floor in the end, lying more or less side by side without looking at other, which freed them up to let mental caresses linger and slide ever closer to where they both wanted it.

“ _Gi – Griddle_ ,” Harrow’s voice sounded as pinched as her face probably was when Gideon – shaking but pretending she wasn’t – first let herself explore between her necromancer’s spindly shaking thighs.

“ _Hah_ , you nearly called me Gideon,” Gideon crowed, but then Harrow’s own fingers – mental fingers; what the fuck ever, Gideon was beyond caring that they were just touching each other with their minds, what the hell –

Harrow’s own fingers traced over the heat and wetness between Gideon’s legs, somewhere only her fingers had previously ever touched, much as she might like to imagine otherwise, and –

“Hah!” The sound burst out of her quite differently this time.

“ _Fuck_ ,” Harrow swore in a whisper when Gideon pressed inside her in return, too impatient for foreplay – although her magazines and her furtive explorations of her own body on the rare occasions she’d been able to snatch back in the Ninth House had informed her that there was this one area that bit higher up, this particularly glorious part that –

“Fuck!” Harrow jolted, nearly lost hold of Gideon’s mind, and sank into her mentally all the harder. She also rocked down on the invisible fingers Gideon had inside her, which was kind of – kind of awesome and weird and _sticky_ all at once, and shit, Harrow was as aroused as hell, which was –

“Fuck,” Gideon returned. She rubbed at that amazing part of Harrow that made the other girl twitch and shiver and jerk on the floor, and this was wonderful, the power Gideon held over her necromancer right now –

“Don’t –” Harrow panted, which was – _oh fuck no_ , Gideon froze – “Don’t get too pleased with yourself, Nav –”

_Oh thank fuck_ , Gideon unfroze, and Harrow took the opportunity to concentrate the feeling of herself-within-Gideon upon Gideon’s – Gideon’s –

“It’s called a clit,” Harrow, Gideon could tell by her voice, was rolling her eyes _so hard_ right now, “Your magazines didn’t tell you that?”

“Wh-what can I say,” Gideon wasn’t really up for coming up with a stellar rebuttal, given it felt like Harrow’s thumb – or what passed for her thumb – had begun circling on that place on herself – her clit – wonderfully, marvellously, if damn fucking slowly. She plunged her invisible fingers deeper with Harrow as a result, thrilled as the other girl shook and cried out, rubbed at Harrow’s own clit in return. “I didn’t get them for the _words_.”

There had been so many euphemisms, in honesty, fleshy living body parts referred to in florid ways that Gideon had felt were hot at the time but certainly nowhere near approaching as hot as the art, and the memory of the stories she had, in fact, pored over was paling in comparison to the reality of being fucked by what was essentially her necromancer’s brain and their shared thoughts.

“Oh god, this is so weird,” Gideon complained, and ground down, and came noisily, thoroughly appreciating it, chasing after every last sensation, panting hard.

Alert even as she gasped and shook that she’d dragged Harrow along with her, a bit before her necromancer was really ready, Harrow biting her lips fiercely in the attempt to remain silent, letting out a helpless high pitched noise Gideon would laugh about later, her internal muscles clamping down on the mental finger Gideon had created until she couldn’t sustain the connection.

They both lay chundering for breath, blood rolling down Harrow’s cheeks from her nose to drip into her hair as they stared at the ceiling.

“You trusted me,” Harrow said eventually, smug, sounding like she needed to drink a gallon of water.

“ _You_ trusted _me_ ,” Gideon returned, plucking at her robes uncomfortably. Bed was beckoning more than ever, if that was possible, but she also felt like washing away the stickiness between her legs – her clothes would be _interesting_ in the morning else – and oddly full of energy despite her exhaustion, like she could go twenty rounds two dozen skeletons each time with her broadsword.

“Stop thinking so vigorously,” Harrow complained.

“Stop telling me what to do,” Gideon bitched right back and flopped her hand out for her blankets like she’d been thinking of doing earlier, letting out a pleased crow when she snagged them, dragging them on top of her any old how.

“You’ll seize up if you sleep on the floor like that,” Harrow was pushing herself with some effort to her elbows, potentially with the intention of wobbling towards her bed.

Yeah, it probably wasn’t going to be eight and a half hours now. Flopping her arm across her head, aching pleasantly for once in her entire existence, Gideon found she couldn’t be too resentful.

And when she glanced out from under her wrist and saw Harrow watching her – just watching, perched on her heels – the other girl almost – _almost!–_ smiled.

“Get some sleep,” Harrow said.

“You know, you quitting talking might help with that,” Gideon pointed out, intensely relieved things weren’t – or didn’t seem to be – going to be weird, and filled with a sort of post-orgasm affection for her necromancer that was clearly just the afterglow.

“We’re going to show those fuckers what for, aren’t we,” She found herself murmuring as a result, and instantly started to tense up in preparation to regret it. But –

“Of course we are,” Harrow sniffed, but that tiny smile was just possibly still curling one corner of her lips, and a last hint of connection sprang up between their minds as she cranked herself the rest of the way up and fell corpse-like onto her bed, like a hand whispering, just gently, across Gideon’s brow.


End file.
